Life Is a Rose, Beware of the Thorns
by CutePiglet
Summary: Yami Yamanashi, famous actor, and his best friend, Yugi Mutou, author of the world's bestseller, never got the chance to spend some time together. But when it's announced that there will be a movie based on Yugi's novel, Yami grabs his chance and takes Yugi with him to shoot the movie. However, Yami never expected that his female co-star could mess up so many things so easily. YxYY
1. Where It All Started

**Author's note: **Hello and welcome to a new story! This idea has been haunting me for a while and I had to give it a shot. I hope I'll be able to fight writer's block with this, because DAYUM writer's block is a bitch. At least I'll have time for the next couple of weeks to actually write, because school's finally over.

So, anyway, hope you like this new story of mine.

**Genre: **Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Friendship

**Pairing(s)**: Yami no Yugi x Yugi Mutou (Puzzleshipping), hinted Yami no Yugi x Anzu Mazaki (Revolutionshipping), hinted Yugi Mutou x Anzu Mazaki (Peachshipping), Anzu Mazaki and Ryuuji Otogi (Persevereshipping) and Katsuya Jounouchi x Mai Kujaku (Polarshipping). Damn, that's a lot of pairings. xD

**Rated: **T

**Summary: **Yami Yamanashi, famous actor, and his best friend, Yugi Mutou, author of the world's bestseller, never got the chance to spend some time together. But when it's announced that there will be a movie based on Yugi's novel, Yami grabs his chance and takes Yugi with him to shoot the movie. However, Yami never expected that his female co-star could mess up so many things so easily. YxYY

Sadly enough, I'm not Kazuki Takahashi, so I don't own YGO. Aw, sad~.

* * *

Having a writer as a best friend did have its advantages, but it also had its disadvantages. Especially when you are a world famous actor. For example, you barely have time for each other, and when you get home, it'll never go further than, "Hi, I had a great day, but now I've got to get those damn lines in my head," or "My character finally confessed his love to the love of his life, but now I'll have throw in a plot twist to make sure the readers won't get bored."

They say that opposites attract, and not like that, but in a best friend way. Living in a normal apartment was the best idea he had ever come up with; no one knew they lived here or would try looking for them here, obviously you would expect a famous actor to live in a huge villa somewhere near the beach.

Living the life as the famous Yami Yamanashi was not as pretty as he thought it would be. And having _the _Yugi Mutou as your best friend was not the best idea. They grew up together in a little town called Domino, their parents lived right next to each other, so avoiding each other everyday would be _Mission Impossible. _Yugi was born in Domino and Yami moved there when he had just turned six, they met the first day, and they had been inseparable ever since. They'd see each other everyday and never got tired of the same old stories they had to tell each other.

When Yugi mentioned something about becoming a writer and that he had all these great ideas in his head, Yami could not be happier for him. His best friend already knew what he wanted to become, and he, himself, had no idea whatsoever. On the other hand, he was only eleven years old at the time, Yugi was ten, but everyone is different.

One day, there were rumors going around, everyone was talking about the most famous director coming over to Domino to shoot a couple of scenes for his upcoming movie. Yugi and Yami were sitting on the porch, playing a game of Truth or Dare. Yami was fourteen years old and Yugi, being a year younger than him, was thirteen. They did not know anything about the famous Riku Iwate, probably because he had only directed romance movies and neither of them was really into romance.

"Okay, Yami, truth or dare?" Yugi had asked him with a sweet, innocent smile. It could only mean one thing, dear little Yugi was up to something. Yami had always loved challenges, he would never back off, so he leaned closer to him with a playful smirk.

"Dare." Yugi's large, purple eyes moved over to the tall director and pointed a slender finger in his direction. He had a dangerous grin on his face, showing his snow-white teeth to the world and his eyes sparkled with mischief.

"I dare you to walk over to that director and say that you want to become an actor." For a moment, Yami felt the color draining from his face, making way for a small red flush on his nose. Yugi knew he hated walking up to random people, especially if they were grown adults and looked really arrogant, like that director. "Or are you too scared?" Yami gave him a look and pushed himself off the ground, dusting off his white pants.

"It's nothing. I'll be back in a minute." He mentally cursed his shyness that was somewhere deep down inside his heart. The shyness only showed up when it came to these things, the walls that he built around his heart fell apart just by looking at the guy. Yami's red eyes were larger than usual and his walk was a little funnier than he could remember. Riku Iwate turned around when Yami came closer, a gentle smile appearing on his face.

"Hey, kid." He bent his knees a little so he could look Yami in the eye, Yami saw himself in those brown eyes that were giving him a friendly look. "Is there something I can do for you?" Yami cleared his throat and raised his finger, as if he was going to point out something.

"My name is Yami Yamanashi, I'm fourteen years old and I want to become an actor," he said in one breath. For a moment, the brown eyes looked confused, then the man stood straight and threw his head back, laughing quite loudly. Oh, he was going to get Yugi back for this. The director laughed for a good few seconds before he ran out of breath and wiped away a small tear that had escaped from his eye.

"Kid, I really like you. Do you even know who you're talking to?" At this point, Yami's face grew blank like the back of one his posters in his room. He had no idea who this director was, but apparently Yugi knew, now all of it made sense. Yami's blank expression disappeared to make way for a mock glare. "My name is Riku Iwate, famous director that broke his own record _six _times, by directing a couple of number ones."

"Then how come I haven't heard of you?" Yami raised an eyebrow, Iwate was already glowing with pride just by saying all those things about himself. He was staring dreamily into distance with a wide smile on his lips. He turned back to Yami, placing a big hand on his shoulder, for a moment, Yami buckled under the weight, that was one strong grip.

"I guess you haven't had a girlfriend, yet. I only direct romance movies and I bet you're not ready for all that mushy stuff." Yami slowly backed away, not liking where this was going. "But let me tell you something. No one's ever walked up to me like you have, saying that they want to become an actor. You've got guts and I like that. Have you ever appeared in a movie before?

"You bet he has!" a new voice said. Both of them turned around to see Yugi standing there with the same mischievous grin on his face like he had a couple of minutes ago. "He's one of the best actors out there!" Yami's eyes widened even more, he had no idea how to act, let alone in front of, apparently, the most famous director in the world. If this was Yugi's way of playing some kind of sick joke, then he was doing a pretty good job.

"Well, we'll see how great he is. Give me your number and I'll let you know when I'll be shooting my next movie. It'll probably be very soon, because I'm almost done with this one and I've already received a lot of letters for my next movie," Iwate said, reaching for his back pocket and getting out a small notebook with a blue pen attached to it. He bit off the top of the pen and let the tip hove over the blank piece of paper, looking at Yami with a grin.

If it had not been for that dare of Yugi, Yami would not be standing here, now twenty years old, leaning against the back of the front door, staring at nothing in particular with two letters in his hand that he had picked up from the ground. Turned out that Yami was really good at acting, Iwate, or just Riku, as Yami called him these days, had said that he was a natural. He soon found out that Yami had never done anything in the world of acting, but that it would not be a problem.

For the past six years, Yami had been the main character in four movies and managed to reach the top of the huge mountain and place a flag there with his name on it for everyone to see.

"Yami?" Yanked out of his thoughts, Yami turned his head to the right, seeing Yugi's head poking out from his room, his reading glasses were balancing on the bridge of his nose and he was smiling at him with that typical Yugi smile of his.

"Hey, Aibou," Yami waved with the letters, walking towards him. He dropped the letters onto the kitchen table and leaned against the doorframe with his shoulder. Yugi's desk was always a mess, it did not matter how many times he organized it, the next day it would just be as bad as the day before. Scattered notes lay everywhere, along with empty cups and different kinds of pens. Yeah, this was the desk of a writer, Yami thought with a small smile on his lips. "So, how many words today?"

"About 2,000," Yugi said, after he had placed two fingers on his mouse pad so he could scroll. "It's almost finished. You should be able to read it in a couple of months, if it gets published that is." Yami leaned on Yugi's shoulders with his elbows, placing his head on top of his best friend's, causing Yugi to close the laptop as quickly as he could.

"Aw, come on, I know you don't want me to read it, so I won't. Don't you trust me?" Yugi turned around so Yami had to remove his arms from his shoulders and gave him a look.

"Do you really want me to answer that? Do I need to tell you what happened when we were-"

"Okay, point taken," Yami said, raising his hands in defense. "Really, though, you can trust me on this one. You've got to have a little more confidence than that. You don't think I will laugh at your writing, do you?" Yugi's eyes slowly drifted off to the ground, a small hint of pink appearing on his pale cheeks. Yami took a seat on the chair next to him, the cushions on the chair let out a soft sigh as he did and he placed a hand on Yugi's arm. "I've never laughed at you before. I know you're one of the best out there. You're a great story teller, which obviously means that you're a good writer, too."

"Uh, Yami—"

"I guess I'll never understand why you won't let me read it until it's published, though I understand that you'll want to change a few things when you read it one more time, but—"

"Yami."

"Yes?"

Yugi grew silent, he looked at the ground, his hand hovered in the air and his glasses were dangerously close to falling off his nose. Yami reached for his glasses and carefully pushed them up again before they got the chance to fall. Instead of thanking him, Yugi got up and picked up those two letters Yami had lain down.

"You left your cellphone here today and someone called, saying that it was really important that you would call them back," Yugi muttered softly. Yami felt a huge knot in his stomach, Yugi sounded pretty upset and that could only mean one thing. Yugi was absently opening the envelopes with a butter knife he had grabbed and pretended that those letters were more important than anything else at the moment. "I left it on the couch, right there." He waved the butter knife towards the brown couch in the corner and continued to focus on the letters.

Yami picked up his blue cellphone and flipped it open, seeing that he had three missed phone calls from Riku. Sucking in his lower lip, he dug his teeth into it and looked back at Yugi, who held out a letter to him. It all fitted together like a puzzle.

"This one's for you. The other one's for me."

"Want to read it at the same time?" Yami said with a nervous, but hopeful smile. Yugi was not amused, though quickly nodded after he had handed him the letter. They looked at each other and Yami gave him a nod and started reading the letter. His eyes softened more with each word and he clutched the letter in his hand, until… His eyes almost popped out of his head and his head shot up like a racket, just like Yugi's, whose eyes were as wide as his.

"Your book-"

"-They're gonna shoot a movie."

"With me in it."

"Directed by Riku."

"…"

"…"

Both letters fell to the ground and both boys stared at each other with the same look on their face. Yugi was in complete shock and so was Yami. He thought that it was gonna be another big movie, but not a movie based on Yugi's first novel!

"I just thought I wasn't gonna see you for a whole year again. I never expected _this_." Yugi was the first one to break the silence, he did not look happy nor sad. Yami walked over to him and held his shoulders, giving him a reassuring squeeze to calm him down.

"Aibou, this is the greatest thing that can happen to a writer. This is great news!" However, Yugi still wasn't satisfied, he took a step back and shook his head.

"No, it's not. I don't want a movie based on my novel," he said vaguely. Yami tipped his head to one side, most of the time, he understood most of Yugi's thoughts, but now he felt like he was standing in the middle of nowhere. He was completely lost.

"Why not?" Yugi turned around, so his back was facing Yami, folding his slim arms over his chest and looking at the wall, clearly indicating that he did not want to talk about it. But Yami wanted to know what was going on, he hated to see Yugi this way. "Don't make me tickle it out of you." Yugi froze on the spot, slowly turning his head over his shoulder with a deadly glare in his eyes. A normal person would have flinched, but Yami knew Yugi way too well that he would not hurt him.

"Yami, I'm serious about this." Yami let himself fall on the couch, running a hand through his wild hair.

"So am I, Aibou. Just tell me what's going on and I'll leave you alone. I hate seeing you like this, especially when I don't know what the hell is going on. Any other writer would've been jumping up and down, not facing the wall, sulking about it." Yugi rolled his eyes and picked up the letter from the ground. "I know it's a story about love and such, and we both know I'm not a huge fan of romance movies, but this is a great opportunity and I will not let it slip through my fingers that easily. Unless you have a very good reason."

"Oh, so you don't have a problem with the fact that you have to have sex with a girl you don't even know in front of at least five cameras?" Yami almost choked and had to catch himself so he would not end up on the floor.

"_What?_" Slowly, Yugi's small lips curled into a sadistic smile and he burst out laughing. "I don't remember that part!" Yugi sat next to him and stopped laughing, patting his arm.

"Don't worry, I'm fooling around. I guess I just have to get used to the idea, I mean, being there on the set, seeing you act like my hero." Yami turned to him with a small frown.

"Your hero?" Yugi gave him a quick wink and leaned into him.

"Words of an author. You'd never understand," he said playfully.

"Does that mean you'll sign the contract?" Yami was more than happy to see that they'd passed the other stage, where Yugi was still angry. Of course, he had every right to refuse, but by agreeing, they could finally spend some time with each other. The only reason that Yugi was so upset was because he thought he would not be able to see Yami for a whole year and that he'd be lucky enough to receive a phone call once per week.

And, honestly, Yami could not wait to spend more time with his best friend. He wrapped an arm around Yugi and drew him closer. Yugi looked up at him, blinking a couple of times and Yami could not help but chuckle at the sight.

"You have Riku's number on speed dial, right?"

* * *

**Author's note: **There we go, that was the first chapter. It practically wrote itself, so I hope it's still okay.

Please let me know what you think by leaving a lovely review~! :3


	2. Journey

**Author's note: **Wow, a fast update. Nine days is very fast for me, it really is. xD  
I'm officially a senior in High School, excuse me while I go celebrate that awesome fact. *dances in confetti*

Thank you for all the reviews, I'm glad people like this new story, makes me feel warm and fuzzy and encourages me to write faster~.

Enjoy the new chapter!

* * *

Walking into the world of _Hollywood _was not quite what she had expected it to be. She had waited three months for these results and she could not even celebrate it with her own boyfriend. With trembling fingers she carefully wiped away the black patches of mascara under her irritated ocean blue eyes. Letting out a shaky breath, she lifted her chin up at her own reflection and gave herself a nod.

"You, Anzu Mazaki, are gonna do great in that movie," she whispered to herself, pointed at the large mirror with the ripped envelope. "And your crazy boyfriend, who just had a rough day at work, will _not _ruin your once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity." She folded her arms over her chest and walked out of the bathroom, tapping the palm of her hand against the light switch. "No matter what he says."

"Anzu." Said person stopped in her tracks and turned around, clutching the envelope in her hand like a lifeguard. The person in front of her had a weak smile on his face that clearly showed that he was sorry for his outburst. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. You deserve this chance, every girl in the whole world wants to be you right now. I guess I overreacted when you told me Yami Yamanashi was gonna be your co-star."

Anzu sighed happily, walking over to her boyfriend and placing the tips of her fingers on his cheek. "I understand why you said that, Otogi. But you can trust me. It's called acting for a reason, we're not really in love. Sure, maybe we will become friends, I don't know, but I don't think our relationship would go further than that. Honest." She pressed a soft kiss on his face, letting her lips brush lightly over his skin with a small smile.

He hesitantly held out his hand, asking her if he could read the letter. She placed the envelope in his hand and leaned on the arm of the kitchen chair. She had always admired everything about her boyfriend, the fact that he was one of the best musicians out there was just a small accessory that came with the whole package.

Otogi Ryuuji had met her when she wanted to become a dancer. He was on his way of becoming a musician ever since his father made it to the top and he and Anzu formed a great team. Over the years, their friendship slowly turned into love and they decided to start a new relationship. And now, a couple of years later, they still love each other very dearly.

Anzu discovered her other talents, such as acting when she heard that Riku Iwate was going to direct a movie based on her favorite book of all time. The minute she auditioned, the crew glowed with pride to have found such a perfect woman for the part.

However, the letter stated that Yami Yamanashi was going to be her co-star and Anzu and Otogi both knew that practically every girl in the world would want to be in her shoes. She and Otogi had a little fight, it was only normal for Otogi to react that way, because Anzu had to admit that Yami _was _quite handsome. But she was faithful, she knew what it was like to be cheated on and she would never want Otogi to experience the same.

"… Anzu?" Otogi walked over to her, placing a gentle hand on her knee. His emerald eyes looked up at hers, he was upset again. Anzu tipped her head to one side, her brown side bangs covering up one of her eyes.

"What?"

"I think you forgot one very important detail in this letter." He handed it back to her, holding his finger over one of the last sentences to point out what he was talking about. Anzu looked at him before her eyes fell back on the letter, reading the sentence over again and as she did, her own eyes grew large.

"O-oh, I forgot. I'm so sorry," she said quietly. "I—" But Otogi shook his head, his black bangs swaying back and forth.

"I wish I could go with you, but I've got a lot of concerts. You should go, it's okay. Just be sure to send me lots of postcards and call me everyday to tell me that you're okay and that I'm way hotter than that Yami Yamanashi guy." Saying the last sentence, he gently held her face, she giggled at his joke and he leaned forward to place a small kiss on her lips.

"Look on the bright side. At least we don't have to pay for the tickets. Riku Iwate already paid for them, we're flying in a helicopter, which kind of scares me, actually…" Anzu laughed nervously, looking back at her boyfriend with a sheepish grin. "Uh, I'll start packing. You go practice for your upcoming concert."

"Will do," Otogi chuckled. "I have to go to a meeting tomorrow morning, so I won't be there to say goodbye. I miss you already, _Sophia._"

* * *

"_Australia!_"

Maybe saying this while Yugi was drinking a glass of _hot _coffee wasn't such a good idea. With a sheepish grin, Yugi handed him his napkin and Yami started wiping the brown liquid off his face. He could not really help it, Riku always been late with informing. Yami had sent the contract a couple of months ago and heard that they had already held auditions for the other parts.

"You could've been a little more, I don't know…" Yugi moved his hands around before dropping them harshly on the table again. "_Subtle?_" He rose to his feet, towering over his best friend with a glare that didn't look very friendly to Yami. "At least warn me before you decide that you want to move to the other side of world, _Yamanashi_."

This time, Yami rose to his feet, too and, in a playful way, pointed accusingly. "_You _decided that your two main characters met in Australia." Yugi pursed his lips, blinking, clearly trying to think of a good comeback. Yami smirked and pulled back, proudly folding his arms over his chest. "I suggest you start packing, because we'll be there for the next couple of months."

Yugi stormed off to his room and pulled out his suitcase, grumbling incoherent things to himself. Yami placed his cheeks in his hands and watched with amusement as Yugi practically threw his stuff in the large suitcase.

"How am I supposed to do this? I've never been on a plane! The only time I leave this apartment is when it's my turn to do the grocery shopping. And I hate that, because there's always someone who recognizes my face." Yugi had stopped packing and was now staring at his best friend, with one hand on his hip and his face apparently stuck in a permanent glare.

Taking a deep breath, Yami dropped his hands onto the table, leaning backwards. "Well, I'll be right there with you. Riku's already ordered the tickets, we'll be sitting next to each other in a private helicopter, not a plane, and I'll help you if you get scared. And about getting recognized, you're going to have to get used to that, because once we're done with the movie, it's gonna be even worse," he said quietly with a small smile. Yugi leaned on the suitcase, dropping his head and looking away from Yami.

"Just… Yami, I'm not used to these things. Travelling, getting recognized, people asking me for my opinion on the set, everything." Yami got up and sat down next to the suitcase on Yugi's bed.

"Aibou, it's gonna be all right. I do this all the time, and it's not that bad. It's weird and kind of awkward at first, but it'll fade. And," he grinned, looking back at Yugi and giving him a small wink. "I heard that my co-star is a really pretty girl. You should ask her out when we get there." Hearing this, Yugi's look grew more intense.

"You do know that I hate it when you start meddling, right?"

"I do." Yugi half smiled and pushed Yami out of the way so he could reach for his bookcase. The older one of the two exactly knew how to annoy the hell out of his best friend, but he knew where Yugi had drawn the lines that clearly said 'back off' and he avoided those lines the best he could. And talking about his love life, was about an inch away from those lines and he loved placing the tip of his toe right there, just to test how far he could go.

"I don't need a girlfriend if I've got you, Yami," Yugi said after he pulled back and laid the few books in the back of his suitcase. "I'm not looking for one, because I'm not lonely or craving for love." Yami was stunned by Yugi's words, never had he heard these words come out of his Aibou's mouth. He knew Yugi was not craving for love, but deep down, everyone is.

At this point, Yugi was sorting out his clothes, picking out summer and winter clothes. He looked over his shoulder at Yami with a warm smile, neatly folding his clothes and placing them in his suitcase. Yami had done a good job at cheering him up a bit. "Why aren't you packing?"

"Already did. I'm so used to getting up at four in the morning that I took a jog, started packing around five and I was done at seven." He got a sock thrown at his head for his words.

"Then go take a jog again. I don't need you breathing down my neck while I pack," Yugi said with a playful smirk. Yami peeled the sock off his face, trying to keep a straight face. He dropped the sock on the floor and grabbed Yugi's wrist, pulling him forward so they ended up in a heap on the sheets, earning a small squeak from the bed. Yugi's legs were thrown into the air and Yami hit the wall with the back of his head.

They both started laughing and Yugi buried his face in Yami's chest, trying to keep his laughter under control. "I should've seen that coming." He raised his head, so his chin was resting on Yami's chest, he looked at Yami, his eyes sparkling with joy. "I miss these moments."

He wrapped his arms around Yugi's slim figure and gently rubbed his back in a circular motion. "We'll get them back. You've got me for the whole helicopter ride and that is a _long _time. We're gonna be together every single day, I'm sure you'll get enough of me at some point." Yugi shook his head, chuckling and placing his hands on either side of Yami's body so he could lift himself up.

"We've been living together for a couple of years and I still like having you around. Doesn't that mean something?" Yami was inwardly wondering if he had crossed one of Yugi's lines yet, he had no idea where this conversation was going and he'd rather not find himself in an awkward situation where he let his feelings take the lead. Luckily, his feelings were buried somewhere deep down and he had tied a real tight knot to make sure they would not escape.

"It means that you have a lot of patience, Aibou," Yami tapped the tip of Yugi's nose and gently pushed him off, sitting up with a small groan. He thought he saw a small glimpse of confusion in Yugi's large eyes, but he pushed it away when Yugi continued packing. Yugi got the message, the conversation had ended and he shouldn't push Yami's buttons.

Best friends usually don't keep secrets from each other, especially if they had known each other practically since birth, but there were some secrets in this small apartment. Those secrets were nothing but small clouds drifting in the air, waiting for the right moment to let the rain of secrets pour.

Yugi and Yami both knew that there were still some clouds in the air, though the rays of sunshine of their strong bond and trust kept the secrets in place. However, the clouds never lasted that long, because one of them would break and the secrets would come pouring out like a waterfall. Most of the time, Yugi was the first one to break and spill everything, because Yugi was pretty good at bottling everything up. Yami always blamed himself, he was not always around to listen to Yugi, so he tried talking to him every time he got the chance and he soon found out that Yugi always avoided talking about himself.

Yami blinked when he noticed that Yugi was waving a hand in front of his face.

"You okay in there? You've been staring at that wall for three minutes straight. And you only stare at things when you're really worried about something. Are you worried about the movie?" Yami rose to his feet, causing him to almost bump into Yugi.

"Nope. I guess getting up at four wasn't such a good idea, after all. I need to lie down for a while." Yugi folded his arms over his chest, tapping his fingers against his clothed arm and pursing his lips. He had raised one eyebrow, indicating that he didn't buy it.

"I'll never know, will I? It's fine, go lie down. I need to finish packing, anyway. Let me know when you're feeling better, you have to fill me in on the whole travelling thing later," Yugi said, patting Yami's shoulder before he gently shooed him out of his room.

"Noted." Yami turned around and gave him a small wink, turning on his heel again so he could see where his feet were taking him.

* * *

"Yami! It's great to see you again!" Iwate pulled him into a bone-crushing hug, patting his back with such force that the air was almost knocked out of him. He heard Yugi stifling his laughter behind him and rolled his eyes, Iwate could be really dramatic. "And you must be Yugi Mutou, come here!"

Yugi held up his hands, grinning. "No, thank you. I'm fine. But it is a pleasure to officially meet you."

Iwate let go of Yami, though he kept his shoulder in an iron grip and pushed him playfully in the chest. "Yami's told me such great things about you. I can't wait to have a nice long talk with you. My people told me that the set looks absolutely great and that they can't wait to meet you." He paused, narrowing his eyes for a second. He let go of Yami's shoulder, who started rubbing his sore joints, walking away from his director and placed his free hand on the suitcase. "Didn't we already meet?"

"The boy in Domino?" Yugi smiled nervously, slowly shrugging. "The one that told you that Yami was a great actor." Iwate reached for his hair, gripping his colored roots and bending his knees, as if he was about to jump out of his skin.

"Goodness, it _is _you! This-this is amazing! I knew Yugi Mutou before he was famous! You were just this big when I saw you." He held a hand just above his hip and started laughing. "I can't believe it! My, you haven't changed, at all."

"Makes me feel like a bag of potatoes," Yami whispered jokingly into Yugi's ear, making him chuckle.

"Now, where's that Anzu girl? It's already past nine, the helicopter should be here soon." As if on cue, they heard a voice behind them. Yami was the first one to turn around and see a beautiful woman running towards them with one hand in the air to wave at them and one on her rolling suitcase that looked like it was going to fall over any minute. "There she is." She came closer and Yami got the chance to really look at her. He held his hand above his eyes to shield them from the bright light. Standing on top of a building did have its disadvantages.

She was absolutely stunning. Her straight brown hair barely reached her slim shoulders and her blue eyes sparkled brightly in the early sunlight. She had one of the happiest smiles on her face and she was practically glowing. Her outfit was simple, yet elegant. A blue blouse, with the two first buttons undone, showing a bit of her collarbone and a dark blue skirt that just went over her knees.

"Hey," she said breathlessly. "Sorry, I couldn't find you, so I started running around, I didn't want to be late. Uh," she let go of her suitcase, brushed her bangs out of her eyes and held out her hand, bowing. "I'm Anzu Mazaki." Iwate cupped her hand with his two big hands and gave her a toothy grin.

"Yes, I remember you very well. You were great at the auditions! Much better than all those other girls, they didn't have that certain sparkle in their eyes that I was looking for," he said proudly. "Well, now that we are complete, I shall inform the captain."

"Wait, where's everyone else?" Anzu asked, a small frown appearing on her face. However, Iwate was already on the phone, walking around, playing with his huge black sunglasses.

"They're already on their way, don't worry," Yami said with a small smile. She quickly turned to him, as if she had not seen him already. "Hi. I'm Yami." Her lips trembled with excitement, Yami's eyes slightly widened, he thought she was going to scream. Fortunately, she didn't and only shook his hand shyly, making a small bow.

"It's such a thrill to meet you. I can't wait to work with you, I simply adore your talent," she said, her voice shaking lightly. She turned to Yugi and her lips continued to tremble. "And it's absolutely great to meet you, too. I loved every word of your novel. I can't believe I got the part, it's like a dream come true to be part of this movie."

"You look just like I'd imagined her to be," Yugi said slowly, studying Anzu slowly as if she was a statue in a museum.

When Yami looked at Yugi, he could not help but chuckle. Yugi's face was bright red as he shook Anzu's hand. Iwate was on his way back to the group and put his phone back in his pocket. All of them looked up as a huge helicopter made its way to the top of the building they were standing on and Yami had to shield his eyes to make sure they would dry out of the huge amount of wind the helicopter brought with it.

"All right, guys! Let's go!" Iwate yelled over the roaring rotor blades. Everyone got in, but when Yugi wanted to get in, Yami stopped him by placing a hand on his shoulder.

"According to your book, Sophia had _black_ hair and _brown_ eyes," he said softly to make sure the others could not hear it. His smirk widened when Yugi glared daggers at him over his shoulder.

"Shut up." He gave Yugi's backside a little push to get him in and closed the door behind him. This was going to a _fun _journey.

* * *

**Author's note: **A fun journey, indeed. I love confusing the hell out of my readers. I really do. It's probably time to work on chapter three to make sure I can update fast again. Australia, I really want to go there one day. Maybe I'll go there next year with a friend of mine, since she wants to go there, too. xP

Again, thanks for reading, y'all are awesome! Please leave a review on your way out, constructive criticism is luuurved~. :3


	3. Black and White

**Author's note: **OH EM GEE, A CHAPTER. Yes, I'm very much alive and typing~. Just thought I'd update this story and thank the people who reviewed. *looks at the title of the chapter* I know it doesn't make any sense now, but it will, trust me.

And when I looked at the reviews, I just noticed that someone was gonna LOCK ME UP IN THEIR CLOSET UNTIL I WAS GONNA WRITE MORE. *breathes fire* But that was just a joke, so it's all good. Tee hee.

And then there was someone who wanted more descriptions of the world around them, so that's what I tried in this chapter. Thank you for pointing it out, I'm always willing to try something else. After all, I'm still trying to find the right writing style for my stories. :3

Anyway, two announcements at the end, but first, enjoy the brand new chaptuuuur.

* * *

The ride was very long and tiring, Yami stayed awake most of the time, he was used to staying up late and getting up very early in the morning, he did not need a lot of sleep. Yugi had fallen asleep on his arm, mumbling some small things under his breath every now and then, which made Yami chuckle every single time. Iwate sat in the front seat, talking nonstop to one of the pilots, there were two, about the fact that he could not wait to direct such a masterpiece.

The pilot was either incredibly patient, or not really listening, because it was almost as if Iwate never paused to take a breath. Anzu, on the other hand, was as quiet as a ninja, she barely moved, or spoke. She was sitting on the other side, next to Yugi, and kept looking out of the window, with her hands folded in her lap. Yami had caught her looking at him and Yugi for a second and then her eyes would jump right back to the window.

He knew it would be better to start a conversation with her, to get to know her and, who knows, become friends. She looked like a nice girl and the fact that she was not all over him, was also very promising. Being very careful, he grabbed the top of Yugi's shoulders and gently pushed him off his arm, pushing until he was leaning against the seat, his head lolled to one side and he continued to sleep. Yami slipped out of his seat, making sure to bend his head so he would not bump against the ceiling.

"Anzu?" Startled blue eyes tore themselves away from the window and looked at his lightly crumbled up form. "You think you can scoot over a bit?" She blinked, but nodded her head. She laid her fingers on her seat and carefully pushed herself up, moving her legs to the right to make way for him. She placed her hands behind her to keep her skirt in place when she sat down again, looking up at him with a nervous smile.

"Thanks." He managed to squeeze himself between her and Yugi, it was a bit uncomfortable having no elbowroom and having her short brown hair in his neck. This was probably how Yugi must have felt for the past eight hours.

Not that he minded, Yami chuckled in his head. He turned to Anzu and smiled kindly. "So far so good?"

"Yeah," she breathed, keeping her eyes on the back of the chair in front of them. "I'm just not used to sitting in a helicopter, at least thousands of feet high in the air." Yami's blood red eyes softened, her hands were shaking against her legs and she was paler than when he first saw her. She slowly turned to him, cracking a smile and Yami noticed how dangerously close her face was. "I'm afraid of heights. I fell out of a really high tree when I was five years old and I've been scared ever since that day."

"Oh…" Yami knew what it was like to have certain fears, he had always been afraid of water ever since he was little. "I know what it's like."

"Really? You're afraid of heights, too?" She looked stunned, as if she could believe what he had said. Her soft and shaky voice was filled with confusion and disbelief. "You look pretty calm to me."

"No, I'm not afraid of heights. I'm afraid of water," Yami explained with a small shake of his head. Anzu's lips formed a silent 'O' and she let out a nervous laugh, however, Yami's face turned serious and she gave him her full attention. "Water is beautiful and powerful, it's something you shouldn't underestimate. I remember that I loved to go to the ocean as a kid. My parents would always take me and play with me in the water, we had lots of fun, so much fun that we went there at least once a week." Yami's face had turned ghostly pale, he felt cold and sweaty at the same time, his hands shook uncontrollably and he tried to swallow a big lump in his throat.

"You don't have to continue if you don't want to," Anzu said in a quiet, sweet voice that could have calmed down any ordinary individual. Her smile was encouraging, a kind smile that made Yami feel better. "I take it something happened one day."

With a small nod, Yami continued. "It was winter, so we were at a pool. I was nine and had just learned how to swim on my own. My parents were sitting on the edge of the pool, talking to each other. It was time to go, so my mom told me to come out of the water and my dad went to grab our stuff. He was gathering our towels and such and my mom was helping him, her eyes weren't on me anymore. I swam towards them with my head underwater-" No matter how many times Anzu squeezed his hand, the painful memories were slowly taking over his mind. He could almost feel the water splashing against his young skin, the laughter of the children around him, everything.

"That was… Until my head crashed into the wall, everything went black and white, I couldn't tell where the surface was. I swam to the bottom, over and over again, bumping my head against the hard floor, trying to get some air, I didn't understand why my head kept bumping against something, because I honestly thought I was going upwards. I was running out of air, my head throbbed painfully and I felt my body going numb at some point. And suddenly, we still don't know why, my mom turned around and saw me. She quickly jumped in and brought me back to the surface." His eyes were moist, he quickly looked away, hoping that Anzu would not notice it. "If she hadn't turned around, I would have drowned."

"I-I'm so sorry, Yami," her voice said. Her blue eyes shone with sorrow, her pink lips thinned and she tipped her head forward. "That's horrible. I understand you don't want to be near water ever again. It's unfortunate that water can also be very dangerous, it's the most powerful thing on earth, well, right next to love." At this point, Yami was frowning and leaning back against the chairs. Iwate was still talking, apparently he hadn't paid attention to their conversation, giving Yami the slight impression that he actually could have some privacy back there. "I always thought you were—"

"What, fearless?" Yami chuckled, looking at her, smiling once again. "That's why it's called 'acting'. I do have my flaws and so does everyone else. Nobody's perfect." Her full lips twitched into a shaky smile and nodded. That was when Iwate turned around and grinned at them.

"Bonding, eh? Great, keep it that way, because you're gonna be doing that a lot on the set." A dark shade of red appeared on Anzu's pale cheeks and she turned her attention back to the window. "Don't fall asleep just yet. We'll be arriving in an hour, or so. We're lucky Sydney is only one hour ahead of Tokyo. That way, we don't have to worry about a jet lag. Wake our little genius up, will you?"

With a small grin, Yami elbowed Yugi in the side, causing the smaller one to wake up with a soft grunt.

"Hm?" Yugi rubbed his eyes with his wrist, looking at Yami with cloudy eyes. Yami saw the reflection of the small window in those large eyes and he smiled at the sight.

"We're almost there, Aibou."

* * *

The hotel was pretty large, you had to press your neck against your back to see where the endless looking walls would end. It looked like a simple hotel, the walls were black, glimmering in the moonlight, which created a beautiful sight. The thing that was very surprising about this building, is that it was simple from the outside and quite elegant from the inside. Simple rich colors were painted on the walls, designs of plants crawling along the sides, giving the illusion of an endless rain of plants. Drinking in all the details, Yami kept turning around on the same spot, trying to see everything at the same time. From the corner of his eyes, he saw that Yugi and Anzu were trying to do the same thing. Iwate was talking to the lady behind the counter, his face was flushed with anger and the lady was trying to calm him down, repeating the same motions with her small hands. She had an apologizing look in her blue eyes behind her round glasses, she was stuttering nervously and Yami saw how pale her face was compared to her neck.

"Oi, what's going on?" Iwate and the woman both looked up, Iwate was gritting his teeth angrily and the woman looked rather relieved that she had an excuse to not look Iwate in the eye for a couple of seconds. Yugi and Anzu stopped gawking at the designs and gave him a confused look, Yugi tipped his head to one side and Anzu had raised her eyebrows. The woman behind the counter cleared her throat, adjusting her glasses and typing something on the black keyboard of her computer.

"Well, we seem to have a small problem here..." she mumbled, lowering her head, so her eyes were barely visible. Yami walked over to the counter, placing the tips of his elbows on the smooth grey surface and folding his fingers together. He gave her simple smile to calm her down and luckily, she did, a small blush forming itself on her pale cheeks. "Instead of four rooms, we only have three. Something must have gone wrong when the reservations were made. I can't find any other free rooms, so two of you have to share a room." Yami blinked, was _that_ what all the fuss was about? He hummed, turning to Iwate, lowering his head dangerously and giving him a look.

"Is that it? One of us has to share a room? I don't see the problem here," he stated. He turned back to the woman, letting his eyes wander down to the computer screen. "I'm sure you can bring us an extra bed, that's all we need." The woman nodded her head and started typing as fast as she could, avoid Yami's gaze like the plague. Yugi walked over to the counter, giving him a small grin.

"I didn't know your English was so perfect, Yami," he said quietly. Yami leaned towards him, slightly rubbing his nose against Yugi's teasingly.

"Well, if your director is an American, you kind of pick up the language, Aibou. Besides, I know your English is just as good as mine." Yugi shrugged, crossing his ankles over each other and leaning against the counter with his lower back. The woman shook her blond bangs out of her face as they were covering her glasses. She turned around to where the keys were hanging and grabbed three of them, placing them on the counter with a small _clang._ Iwate pursed his lips at the golden objects, grabbing them and eyeing them carefully.

"All right. I ordered an extra bed for the room. You can leave your suitcases here, we will bring them to your room. I just need to know which one of you will be sharing a room." Yami smirked at the way Yugi's head moved towards Anzu's, his eyes twinkling dangerously. Yugi's lips parted to answer the question, but Yami wrapped an arm around his shoulder, pulling him close to his body.

"We'll share room. We also share an apartment, so it shouldn't be a problem for us." Yugi's jaw hit the ground when the woman told them where their room was and Iwate handed him the right key. Anzu waved at them, running after Iwate since their room was on the east wing.

"Yami, Yugi, I want you here in the lobby at five sharp!" Iwate yelled over his shoulder. "And don't forgot to bring your swim trunks, because we'll start practicing for the first scene right away." Yami's feet froze to the ground, he could not take another step. He felt trapped in a nightmare, that terrifying moment where a monster is chasing you and you cannot move one single muscle. Slowly, a warm feeling was developing in his stomach and it quickly made way for nausea.

"W-what?" He looked over his shoulder, his face was as pale as a sheet and his eyes were wide with fear. Yugi had grown silent, he had sucked in his lips in an attempt to keep himself from making the situation worse, if that were even possible. In some miraculous way, Iwate had heard Yami's words (he had whispered them) and turned around. Anzu was also staring at Iwate, her cerulean eyes only showed a small amount of confusion, and then, her eyes also widened, like Yami's.

"Yeah, for the big swimming scene we added," Iwate said, his eyebrow had disappeared under his green cap, acting as if Yami had questioned why humans needed oxygen to live. Reaching for his head, Yami shook it, he felt a throbbing pain behind his eyes, he hated to admit that he was… terrified. His legs shook dangerously under his weight, if Yugi had not been holding his arm, his knees would have fallen to the ground.

"I totally forgot about that," Anzu murmured, realization written all over her face. She had known and apparently forgotten it, too. Three men walked up to them with small carts and hoisted their suitcases up with small grunts. Two of them walked past Iwate and Anzu and the last one past Yami and Yugi. However, Yami barely noticed them, his eyes were still fixed on Iwate's annoyed ones.

"You did read the script before you said yes, right?" Iwate sighed, rubbing his tired eyes. "Don't tell me you said yes because you felt like it. And don't you dare tell me you're quitting just because your hair is gonna get wet. We have stylists, your hair will be fine!" Anzu rolled her eyes, placing her slender fingers on her waist, the fabric of her skirt wrinkled under her touch.

"Do you honestly think his hair is the issue here?" The director merely shrugged it off.

"Whatever it is, I'm sure he can get over it," he said simply. He turned back to the pale Yami. "You signed that contract. At five am, you will have your ass here with your swim trunks ready, if not, go home, because we are doing that scene, with or without you. If you decide to go home, know that I'm not paying for your ride." And with that, he walked away without giving a second glance. For the second time that day, Yugi's jaw hit the floor.

"I-I thought he was a nice guy?" he said when he was sure Iwate was out of earshot. Yami was still frozen on the spot, he was stuck in his small world of memories, just like he was during the flight with Anzu, the endless pain in his head, the cold water sucking the air out of his lungs, the blackness in front of his eyes… "Yami?"

"Hm?" Snapping out of his trance, Yami stared down at his concerned friend. Anzu had walked over to them and was now looking at Yami with a apologizing smile. "He's only nice when he gets what he wants. Plus, he gets cranky when he's tired. Trust me, I'd know."

Anzu groaned in frustration and ran a hand through her messy hair. "I should've remembered this important thing. Especially when you told me that story about your experience with water. I don't understand how I could have forgotten that really important fact!" Yami's eyes softened and he placed a comforting hand on her arm.

"Don't blame yourself, Anzu, it's not your fault. If it's anyone's fault, it's mine. I forgot to read the script," he explained softly.

"And I thought that this movie was based on my novel. There is no water scene!" Anzu had sunken to her knees and zipped her small bag open. She got out a small roll of paper and rolled it open, flipping over the first few pages. Then, she turned it around and tapped her finger against the page, showing Yami where to read.

"Here it is, they added this scene where I lose my grandmother's necklace and jump into the water so I can retrieve it, but my character isn't such a good swimmer so you jump in after me to save me." Yami read the small scene, needing to be sure. And there it was, his character dove into the water to save the 'mysterious girl and her necklace'. "Where's your script?"

"In my suitcase. I've read the book twice and I didn't think they were going to add more scenes to it, so I didn't think it was necessary for me to read it," Yami said sheepishly. Anzu lowered the script, rolling it up and tapping it nervously against the palm of her hand. "Well, I'll come with a solution tomorrow morning. We're tired and we're not thinking straight. Everything will be better tomorrow." Anzu faked a smile, said goodnight and walked away.

"Yami…" Yugi breathed, looking up at him, dragging his fingers down Yami's arm in an attempt to calm him down. His body relaxed a little under Yugi's soft touch, but the nagging feeling in the back of his head was impossible to push away. He heard a small cough and turned to the woman behind the counter. A small red flush appeared on his nose, he had completely forgotten that they were standing in the middle of the lobby and that everyone could enjoy the small scene they had made.

"I'm not sure if this helps, but I just wanted to say that we have five different swimming pools in our hotel, they open at three a.m. and close at eight p.m. I'll give you a small brochure so you can look at them yourself." She reached down and slipped a small blue brochure onto the counter, smiling shyly. Yami found out that he was finally able to walk again and strode over to the counter to pick up the small brochure.

Well, it was a nice offer.

"Thank you. Goodnight," Yami said, smiling gratefully and waved at her with the small brochure, dragging Yugi to the elevators. He could not believe how stupid he must have looked in front of that woman and Anzu. As an actor he had his pride and just by mentioning the word 'water' or anything that was related to that word, he nailed to the ground. Once they were in front of the big elevator area, he pressed the white button that lit up and heard a small ding, the doors opened, revealing a large room, the walls were covered with red velvet and on the back wall hung a large mirror. For the first time that day, Yami saw his own face. A weary face stared back at him, his eyes were slightly irritated and small dark circles were developing around his eye area.

By looking at his key, Yami figured out which button to press and pressed the one with small 33 on it. He leaned against the wall, noticing how soft it felt against his clothed shoulder. He raised one foot and rested it against the wall to get into a comfortable position. Yugi stared at him via the reflection, his eyes looked dazed, yet wide awake and alert, maybe it was the illusion the dim light of the elevator created.

"What are you going to do?" he said to Yami's reflection. For some reason it was easier to talk to Yugi's reflection than face to face. They always kept this subject as far away as possible, they both knew it was hard to talk about his fear, because every time he did, his mind would be overwhelmed by the most painful memories of his childhood.

"I don't know. Call my lawyer?" Yami answered dryly, trying to lighten up the mood. With a small chuckle, Yugi shook his head, reaching for Yami's hand to grasp it in a firm grip.

"I'm serious, Yami. You're not gonna quit, are you?"

"Nah. I've come all the way to Australia and I've always loved challenges. It's just a stupid fear that I've developed over the years. I will get over it, one way or another."

"It's not stupid, you almost _drowned_," Yugi said, squeezing his hand. Suddenly, a last minute plan popped into Yami's head and he tore his gaze away from the mirror, looking Yugi straight in the eye.

"You're gonna teach me how to swim!" Yugi's eyes widened and he took a step back.

"_Eh?_" A wide grin spread across Yami's tired face and his whole expression lit up.

"It's perfect. We'll get up at three, we'll go to one of the pools and you teach me how to swim," he said, beaming.

"I don't know… Last time we tried it didn't go so well," Yugi said, rubbing the back of his neck. He looked back at Yami, his face dropping. "Besides, you do realize that it will be three in the morning, right? The chances of me drowning are higher than ever, because I'm not really the brightest around midnight."

"I'll buy you some coffee and chocolate, that should wake you up," Yami said with a smirk. He was not letting this go, Yugi was going to go with him whether he wanted to, or not, it was the only thing he _could _do instead of humiliating himself in front of at least hundreds of people on the set tomorrow. "Come on, Aibou. It should be fun, no one's crazy enough to go swimming at three in the morning, so we'll have the pool to ourselves and besides, this whole trip was about us spending time together." Yugi laughed softly at him, folding his arms over his chest.

"You're never gonna let this go, are you?" With the same smirk plastered onto his face, Yami shook his head. Yugi let out a defeated sigh. "Okay, fine. But remember, I'm only doing this because you're my best friend and I love swimming."

There was another small ding and the doors opened again. Yami looked over his shoulder at the beautiful hallway in front of them. He grabbed Yugi's hand and pulled him close, wrapping an arm around his waist and whispering a small thank you in his ear.

* * *

**Author's note: **Yes, this is where the chapter ends. The pool scene needs to be in the next chapter, because a voice in my head keeps telling me that. But hey, this chapter is pretty long, it has to end at some point. xP

I noticed that the fact that Riku Iwate is an American is a little confusing, but that will all be clear in a few chapters, so don't worry your pretty little heads about it, 'kay?

So… let's move onto the small announcements I was gonna make. I'm leaving Tuesday to go on vacation with my family, it wasn't my idea, _they _are dragging me along. xD I'll be away for two weeks, but there's a slight chance that I will update within those two weeks. If not, I'll just update at the end of August.

The other announcement would be about _A Death Wish_. I'm not gonna make a rant, the only thing I want to say is that it's getting harder for me to write that story, as I've mentioned in its last chapter. So please bear with me.

Thanks for your patience, you guys are awesome. ^^

And for those who don't understand the title of the chapter, I shall say it right here; I was referring to Yami's incident in the pool. What? I thought it would be cool. *poker face*

Please review! Constructive criticism is loved~. See you next chapter! x3


	4. Are You Ready?

**Author's note: **HAI. I always keep my promises. Yes, I do. I shall not make another promise, because of reasons.

Anyway, here's the new chapter, it's _long_, around 7,000 words, gotta love me for it. *pats her own shoulder* So much fluff (SQUEEE~) in this chapter~~.

Thank you for all your reviews, you guys are awesome! :3

Enjoy!

* * *

The phone rang a couple of times, with a small yawn she listened as the phone beeped every two seconds softly in her ear. She had buried her nose in the soft pillows of the bed, breathing in the sweet scent of the freshly washed sheets and pillowcases. These were the softest pillows she had ever lain her head on.

After almost ten hours in a helicopter, she had managed to take a quick shower, put on her pajamas and crawl under the huge covers of the large bed. Her eyes had adjusted to the dark already, from the corner of her eyes, she admired one side of her room, where the man had carefully placed her suitcase. She had carelessly thrown it open, grabbed her toiletries, such as toothpaste and her toothbrush and make up remover.

She admired this hotel for its class, the bathroom was absolutely breathtaking, the tiles were pearly white, there was a huge bathtub _and _a shower. She had let the water rain over her, washing away the nerves and the other feelings that had been nagging her since the trip. And now, she was lying in bed, feeling fuzzier and cleaner than she had ever been in her entire life. Her cloudy eyes had almost drifted close, until she heard a small click.

"Hello?" a tired voice said on the other side of the phone. Anzu smiled at her boyfriend's voice, somehow it always calmed her down and satisfied her.

"Hey," she whispered, even though she knew the walls were so thick that the people on the other side would not hear her if she talked aloud. She was tired, almost exhausted and could not find the strength to louden her voice. "I wanted to let you know that we've arrived at the hotel, all safe and sound and that I miss you." Like a teenage girl, she pulled her legs up in the air, curling up her toes when Otogi chuckled.

"That's great to hear, babe. I'm glad everything went smoothly. So, how does it feel to be around famous people?" Anzu buried her face further into the pillows, humming happily.

"Nerve-wracking," she joked lightly. "Meeting Yami Yamanashi and Yugi Mutou was truly an amazing experience. I was expecting Yami to be very cocky and Yugi to be a very closed person, I was afraid that they would ignore me. The last thing that I expected was Yami to start a conversation with _me!_" Maybe she had sounded a bit too enthusiastic, because Otogi was silent for a couple of seconds. Anzu was secretly hoping it was because of the bad connection, but deep down she knew she had gone a little too far.

"Glad you can get along so well," Otogi said in a forced happy voice. "Are you sure it isn't some kind of act? What if he's a player and is trying to win over your heart to satisfy his own hunger for girls like you." Anzu had risen from the mattress, gripping the sheets tightly in her fist, she was glaring daggers at nothing in particular and huffed.

"He's not like that, Otogi. I know he's good at acting, but I've _seen _the way players look at girls. Guys have cheated on me before, I would've known if he wanted to talk me into his bed. Guys like that know how to seduce every single girl, because of their multiple personalities, to me, it looked like Yami had only one personality and I liked it. My ex boyfriends changed personalities practically every five minutes, they were never satisfied with what I said to them and they were pretty good at showing me that!"

Widening her eyes in horror, Anzu slapped her hand over her mouth. The anger that she had bottled up over the past years had slipped out of her, like a waterfall and she could never take them back.

"Those guys…" Otogi said darkly. "They really hurt you, didn't they?" The burning tears slowly moistened her eyes, there were tears from exhaustion, anger and sadness. She had never seriously talked to Otogi about this subject, she avoided it the best she could, because she knew that it was going to hurt.

"I-I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that," she whispered after a long silence. They fell into a small silence, she could hear Otogi breathing on the other side and she listened, crossing her legs and traced formless patterns on the mattress. "I have to go now, it's late and we have to get up early. We'll talk about this another time."

"You mean when you come back after six months, or so?" The coldness in his voice was practically dripping off the phone and a short breath left Anzu's slightly parted lips. She knew how protective Otogi had always been, even now, she would probably never see one of her ex-boyfriends again and still, he was mad. It was best if she quickly changed the subject and hung up, she did not want to wake up with moist eyes.

"I'm barely awake, Otogi. I'm already lying in bed," she mumbled quickly. She laid her head on the pillow, crushing the phone in her hand, waiting anxiously for his respond. Her boyfriend made a sound that sounded like 'fine' and he sighed loudly. "I'm sorry for ruining our conversation, but I have to get up before five and we're going to practice our swimming scene."

"Ah, yes, you showed me that scene in the script." Otogi sounded a bit calmer now and Anzu inwardly smiled, her plan had worked. They talked a little for a couple of minutes until Anzu's eyes drifted close after she heard a small beep and the phone, that had become very heavy, slipped through her fingers.

* * *

Hundreds of meters away Yami lay fast asleep in his bed. He hadn't bothered to take a shower before he went to bed, just simply threw his clothes aside, put on some random pajama pants, set the alarm clock that was right next to his mattress and crashed onto the bed. Yugi had done the exact same thing, he had almost tripped over Yami's clothes on his way to the spare bed in the room, but was too tired to realize it or remember it in the morning.

Luckily, they had not met any other people on their way to the room, the hallway was very quiet and Yami was not sure if it was because it was late or the fact that Iwate had maybe outdid himself, reserving the whole floor for just the two of them to make sure they would not be bothered by fans.

Their room was painted beige, Yami's bed was pure white and so was Yugi's spare bed, the carpeted floor had a stream of endless patterns, leading towards the halls, two bathrooms and another room that was connected to their room. They hadn't had the energy to see the other room, but they guessed it was a lounge. Around their beds were a couple of chairs and tables, even a bookcase with several English novels (Yami's tired eyes had sparkled for a second; reading was one of his favorite pursuits) and a couch. Their suitcases were placed next to each other in one of the corners, next to a lamp that shone softly next to the window.

After what only seemed a few minutes, the alarm clock started to beep softly. Yami made a soft irritated noise before he reached for that stupid piece of metal, searching for that one button that would end the endless beeping noises. Through half-lidded eyes he saw that it was three a.m. and for a moment, he blinked, debating in his head why the hell that alarm clock had woken him at this hour. Then, his eyes drifted off to Yugi's sleeping form and he nodded to himself, remembering that they were supposed to go swimming.

And then a huge wave of nervousness crashed into him, pressing against his chest and making him feel heavy. Now that he was closer to the pool he suddenly felt uncertain, he kept looking at Yugi's face, thinking that maybe he could let him sleep and go back to sleep himself, push the whole idea way. Not only would have to deal with an angry Yugi in the morning, but also deal with the humiliation on the set in front of the whole crew.

Even with his eyes closed, Yugi seemed to penetrate his mind, convincing him to go swimming, because he knew he'd regret it later if he didn't.

With a small smile on his lips, Yami pushed the covers off with his feet and climbed out of bed, almost getting tangled in the sheets as he barely saw what he was doing. He searched for the light switch, letting the tips of his fingers slide over the wall on his way to the door, he guessed it was right next to it. He was right, because the next second, he had to close his tired eyes to protect them from the bright light, and Yugi was _still _asleep.

Sometimes Yami wished he was able to sleep through the alarm clock like Yugi easily could, just so he could sleep a little longer and use it as an excuse to be late on the set. With a small shake of his head, he walked over to the bed, sunk to his knees and gently shook Yugi's shoulder. His eyes darted to Yugi's face, seeing it scrunch up in protest and then relax again, clearly oblivious to the fact that Yami was trying to wake him up.

Curling his lips into a small smile, he tucked the sheets off Yugi's body, meeting Yugi's simple blue pajama shirt and pants. His shirt had moved up a bit which caused his slim stomach to be exposed. Yami playfully poked the soft skin and he received a quiet chuckle in response, Yugi's body curled itself up to avoid Yami's fingers. Yugi's eyes blinked open and he looked down at Yami, smiling tiredly.

"Hey," he croaked out. He rolled over to his back, stretching his arms towards the high ceiling with a small groan and letting out loud yawn. "All right. Let's go, the sooner the better." Laughing softly, Yami stood up and got dressed. Yugi did the same, grabbed his swim trunks and followed him to the bathroom to splash some cold water in his face and brush his teeth. After spitting out the left over toothpaste Yami looked at Yugi with a sheepish smile.

"What?" Yugi blinked curiously, putting the toothbrush aside and drying his face off with a small towel that hung next to the sink. The water was still running freely out of the tap as Yami rinsed his hands.

"I don't have any swim trunks." Yugi stopped his actions, stifling a laugh.

"Are you saying you want to go skinny dipping at three in the morning?" Yami splashed some water towards him, receiving a small yelp from his best friend. Yugi reached for the sink and splashed him, too. Yami laughed and grabbed his wrists before he created a small pool in the bathroom.

"Let's save that for the pool, Aibou." Yugi stuck out his bottom lip for the briefest moment before he pulled his hands out of Yami's gentle grip and dried himself off once again. After they had left the room, Yami took out the brochure to find out where the closest pool was and slid his finger over to the name of the pool on the 51st floor. Yugi looked over his shoulder and pressed the small button in the elevator with a small 51 on it.

"I'm sure you can buy some swim trunks there, at least I hope so," Yugi looked up at him with a sadistic smile. "For your sake." A slow smile crept over Yami's face, but he decided to ignore the comment, knowing that Yugi was just trying to push his buttons. He could always go swimming with his clothes on, or… his eyes widened at the thought. Wet clothes are heavy and can easily drag you to the bottom, so maybe swimming with clothes on wasn't such a good idea. He would come up with something as soon as they got there.

The elevator let out a small _ding_ and the doors slid open. The smell of chlorine washed over them and the soft sound of water splashing against walls echoed through the halls. Yami felt a lump in his throat, the smell of chlorine brought some memories with him and the sound of water made him feel dizzy. Yugi saw the look on his face and grabbed his hand in a firm grip.

"At least we know we got the right floor," he said somewhat dryly. Yami felt that he nodded and let Yugi drag him around. As expected, no one was there, except for a small kennel with a sleepy woman in it. She was staring dreamily at the blue walls with water patterns painted on them, it looked she was going to fall asleep any minute. Her red hair was tied back in a loose bun and small round glasses were positioned on the bridge of her small button nose. Her green eyes were dull and cloudy looking, her lids were almost closed. Yami could imagine that it was hard to stay awake all night and having no company whatsoever.

"Excuse me," Yami said when they reached the kennel. She snapped out of her daze almost immediately and quickly folded her hands together, a warm smile plastered on her face.

"Oh, what a lovely surprise. Someone actually comes here around three in the morning," she said, her tired and hoarse voice lingering in the air for a moment. "How can I help you?" She leaned forward, studying Yami's face carefully as if she was looking for something.

"Can we get a pair of swim trunks here?" Yami said awkwardly. The woman looked bewildered, apparently she had not expected that question. Of course not, Yami thought, everyone is smart enough to bring their own swim trunks. She adjusted her round glasses that were far too big for her eyes and cleared her throat, sorting out some papers that were lying on her desk.

"Uh, yes, certainly, sir," a small rosy red color coated her pale freckled cheeks. She looked at him over the rim of her glasses, chewing her bottom lip, and then she sat up straight and leaned over the counter, pointing a finger at the two corners at the end of the hall. "When you go to the right, you'll walk into the locker room, you can change there and leave your belongs there and there will also be a closet with bathing suits, swim trunks, bikinis, you name it. We have all kinds of sizes, from extra small to extra, extra, extra, extra large."

Yugi raised an eyebrow at the statement. She laughed nervously and pointed a finger to the left side. "And when you go to the left, you'll see the swimming pools. We have three different swimming pools, one for toddlers and children, the other two are for adults, one for beginners and one for advanced swimmers. If you need any more information you can always ask me." Yami blinked at her, she had obviously rehearsed this at least a hundred times, she sounded like a robot, a rather tired robot.

"Thanks," Yugi said. "We'll go to the locker room, then." He dragged Yami towards the end of the hall and practically flew to the right, closing the door behind him.

* * *

The smell of chlorine became stronger as they neared the actual swimming pool and Yami's heart started beating faster with every single step he took. He was wearing a pair of blue swim trunks, the first pair he saw, and Yugi was wearing a pair of green swim trunks. He did not want to admit that he was actually trying to pull his arm out of Yugi's iron grip, but Yugi's grip was so strong that he was probably aware that Yami wanted to get away.

"I'm right here, Yami. Nothing's going to happen," he suddenly said. Yami let out what sounded like a small choke when they stood on the edge. "Let's see… This is the toddler's pool, we'll go in the beginner's pool. Unless you want to—"

"Aibou."

"Okay, okay, then we'll go to the beginner's pool, come on." Yami knew Yugi was only trying to cheer him up, he was doing a good job at it, but as soon as they reached the other pool, he was back to his old nervous self again. The pool was huge, and according to the signs, the water was about five feet deep. There were different diving boards, some small stairs and when Yami looked ahead, he saw a closet full of tools, such as colored boards and balls to keep one floating. "You want one of those?" Yami shook his head.

"No."

"But, Yami, that's how everyone learns to swim in the beginning and if you hold onto them, you'll never sink." Yami noticed that Yugi's grip had weakened and he pulled his arm back, rubbing it.

"I've got you. I don't need those things." Yugi looked at him for a small moment, blinking and then he shrugged, carefully stepping into the water. Yami carefully took a step back, trying not to slip since the floor was very slippery. "Aibou…"

"Come on, you can do it," Yugi said, swimming over to the edge and placing his wet fingers on it, smiling reassuringly at his best friend. "You can stand here, nothing can happen." Yami slowly sank to his knees, placing his fingers on the edge, barely touching Yugi's hands.

"It doesn't matter if you can stand," he whispered to the floor, his hands were shaking and his breathing was far out of control. He felt his heart beating in his ears, making him feel even dizzier, he felt nauseous and sweaty, he could not do it. He just… couldn't.

"I have an idea. Look at me," Yugi said, reaching for Yami's head and gently lifting it up. The water trickled down his jaw when Yugi held his cheek with his wet hand. "Tell me how we first met while slowly stepping in. You always say it was the best day of your life." The warm feeling that slowly crept over Yami's body was alarming him, the warmth in his stomach, the _other_ kind of dizziness and the shiver that ran down his entire spine, all the way to his legs and the tip of his toes. Yugi's eyes looked at his own, if he were staring into his soul and could read his mind.

"Aibou…"

"Stand up, sit on the edge and slowly step into the water," he said softly, the gentleness of his voice slowly brushing over Yami's body. He slowly got onto his feet and took a step closer to the water. "Good. Grab my hand… Yes, and now tell me how we met while stepping into the water. Take your time." He took a deep breath, squeezed Yugi's hand and closed his eyes, carefully sitting himself onto the cold wet floor. He had folded his bare feet under his legs and slowly let them slide into the cold water. "Talk, Yami, it'll make things easier, trust me."

"W-well," his voice was shaking so badly that he could barely make out his own words. "I was six years old, you were five and…" he gasped softly when one of his feet was completely underwater. Yugi was urging him to keep going. "I was playing outside with one of my favorite balls, because my parents were moving our furniture inside and…" Now his other foot was completely under water, too. The cold water softly splashed against his feet, gently caressing the skin.

"You're doing great. Now carefully push yourself in with your other hand." Yami felt the hotness of the tears in the back of his eyes, he felt himself shaking against the floor and his hand shaking in Yugi's. "You can do it." With his other hand, he pushed himself forward, feeling the water creeping up his legs as he came closer.

"I accidentally dropped my ball and it rolled away, I ran after it until I saw that someone had picked it up for me. That person held the ball in front of my face and that's when I first met you." Now Yami's torso was also in the water, his eyes were squeezed shut and his breaths were uneven and heavy.

"Open your eyes, Yami." Slowly but surely, he opened them and looked down, he saw the wrinkles his body had created in the water and the weird shapes of his body that was underwater. His feet were now resting on the hard floor of the pool, the water did not go higher than his chest so his arms still stuck out. "See? Everything's fine. You did it." Yugi flashed him a smile, exposing his even teeth and slowly pulled Yami farther into the water.

"A-Aibou—"

"We're doing it very slowly. Just walk with me," he said. Before Yami could control himself, he lunged forward and clung to Yugi, a small tear leaked out of his eye and fell into the water, he was glad Yugi wasn't able to see it. He had a strong grip on Yugi's shoulders and felt himself shaking against the wet, yet warm skin. "It's okay, Yami. It is a huge step to take. I think you're really brave." The other whispered in his ear, rubbing his back soothingly. He tried to pull back, but Yami only tightened his grip.

"Don't," Yami commanded softly. "I can't…"

"Yes, you can. I know you can do it, we even went swimming together one time and we had a really great time," Yugi told him. Yami hesitated for a moment, trying to remember what Yugi was saying to him. "You had turned eight and I was seven. You were still learning how to swim and tried to explain to me how to keep your head above the water. And now, the roles are reversed and I'm not leaving until you feel safe enough to let go of me."

Yami saw himself and Yugi playing in the pool, Yami trying to keep Yugi's head above the water and Yugi splashing around, trying to get out of his friend's grip. It hadn't ended up so well after they started splashing water towards the other and playfully pulling each other under water. Back then, Yami was oblivious to the fact that water could be so dangerous and still could be… fun. He pulled back, seeing the satisfaction appearing on Yugi's face, he was happy that his plan had worked.

"Shall we? Hold my hand." He held his hand and let himself going deeper into water, he wanting nothing more than to get out, run away and never come back. He thought about quitting the movie, so he could go home again and forget about this whole trip in an instant, but then he would ruin the whole opportunity to spend time with Yugi. In all honesty, he did not care a lot about this movie, the whole idea of him spending more time with Yugi was so humoring that he could not let it go. This whole thing was actually about…

"Aibou," Yugi turned around, smiling. "Thank you."

"You're more than welcome." He could not tell him, Yugi was always too busy with his books, his plots, characters and so on, he would never have time to even consider going somewhere with Yami. But now, he had a new job, which made him able to be with Yami the whole day, back in their apartment they could only see each other before both of them went to sleep. This small feeling, deep down his heart had developed itself over the years, growing until they had almost taken over. Being an actor had its benefits, he was always able to hide his true feelings, but they were never effective when it came to Yugi, he was always able to see past his poker face. Except this time, because he had been keeping this poker face for more than twelve years, up to the point where he was not even sure if he was hiding it, or not.

Every time Yugi smiled at him, a small sparkle flew around in his body, a happy sparkle that lit up his entire mood. It was enough to make him happy after a tiring day on the set, after a fight, even after something terrible happened. Yugi did not even have to try.

He was so lost in his own train of thoughts that he had not noticed that Yugi had let go of his hands quite a while ago. He blinked, looked down and quickly swam over to Yugi, reaching for his arms. "Aibou…!"

"You were so lost in thoughts and you moved naturally on your own. You know, I think, deep down, you still love swimming more than anything in the world, but that small incident held you back. I know that water can be dangerous, very dangerous, but know that I'll be there on the set in a couple of hours, there will be a whole crew to help you if you lose control. You're a good swimmer and you'll always be. All you needed was a small push, you got over your fear so easily, and I'm starting to think you didn't even need my help." Yami buried his nails in Yugi's shoulders, noticing how warm Yugi's skin still was against his cold, numb hands.

"No, I did. If it weren't for you, I never would've stepped in the water. You were right, I guess I needed a small push," he mumbled, letting his fingers slide down Yugi's shoulder until they dropped in the water. Yugi fully turned to him, smiling brightly, rubbing his arm soothingly.

"Well, then there's only one thing left to do. We are going to get out of the water, I'm going first and you have to swim to the egde yourself. This time, without getting lost in your thoughts, okay?" He flicked Yami's nose playfully and swam away. For a moment, Yami stood there, with his feet nailed to the smooth surface of the pool, he watched Yugi's pale back moving farther away from him with each passing second. He felt powerless, the water was softly splashing against him, washing over him teasingly. It could happen any minute, he would lose control and swim to the bottom over and over again until he lost consciousness.

"Come on, you can do it!" Yugi yelled when he was standing on the edge of the pool, he was waving encouragingly at him and gave him a small wink. The huge breath that left his mouth caused water to splash onto his face, he blinked the remaining water out of his eyes and gave a wild kick. His whole body moved forward, the unnatural blue water ran across his skin as he gave more kicks with his feet, his body moved along with his arms. The look on Yugi's face was indescribable, the glint in his eyes, the smile that almost reached his eyes and the way his hands were shaking in anticipation…

If only he knew the truth.

Yami was breathless when he reached edge, he rested his fingers on it and also his forehead to hide his face. Yugi reached for his underarms and, with Yami's help, heaved him out of the water so Yami could lie on the cold floor. He rolled over to his back, bended his knee and laid his arm over his eyes to shield them. Yugi's heavy breaths slowed down until they became light and barely audible.

"Yami?"

"Give me a second," was Yami's answer. He felt the hot salty liquid trickle down the side of his face, along with the excess drops of water, he had never been so grateful to water. He resisted the urge to sniff, instead he sat up and rubbed his face, pretending to rub the chlorine out of his eyes.

"You did great, you should be proud of yourself, _Other Me_." That woke Yami up. His head snapped towards Yugi, he had not used that nickname in _years_. That nickname had once slipped out of Yugi's mouth when they were still little, he had used it because there were so much alike and had developed such a strong bond. These days, however, Yugi never called him that anymore, even though Yami did not mind at all, in fact, he liked that nickname, it made him feel somewhat connected to his best friend.

Yugi crawled towards him and rested his forehead against his own, letting the tips of their noses touch. How long they sat like that was not fully registered in Yami's mind, he liked sitting like this, with his eyes closed and feeling the warmth of Yugi's forehead spreading through his entire body. He breathed in Yugi's natural scent, a scent that was so familiar yet so mysterious, it was sweet and bitter at the same time, but never unpleasant. He slowly opened eyes to meet Yugi's big kind lavender ones, a fake smile spreading across his face.

He was not going to be able to get himself out of this mess.

After a few hours, Yami, Yugi, Anzu, Iwate and the rest of the crew were standing next to a huge water tank. Just by looking at it, Yami felt the color draining from his face; it looked, and probably was, very deep. The hall they were was about as big as a mansion, there were different sets in each area, Yami even recognized a couple of sets, some of them were exactly how he imagined those areas to be.

After the pool event, he and Yugi had run back to their room, taken a shower and put on some new clothes. Yami had bought the swim trunks and was wearing it underneath his clothes. They quickly went to one of the hotel restaurant and, as promised, Yami bought Yugi some breakfast and coffee as a small 'thank you.' Iwate was now explaining the whole thing to them, Anzu was fiddling nervously with her blouse, Yami could see the edges of her red bathing suit appearing when her blouse moved slightly.

"Okay, Yami, we'll be practicing this scene for the next couple of weeks, that way you can practice swimming to the bottom and retrieving the items we throw in. We will slowly build things up, we won't start with the necklace, since it's only this big," Iwate held up a very small, fragile looking necklace that would fit perfectly around Yami's wrist. "We'll start with things like small toys and such. Also, we have to know if you're capable of saving the real Anzu or saving a doll. Saving Anzu would obviously be harder, we made the doll very light so it would be easier to retrieve."

At this point, Anzu, who was standing next to Yami, raised her eyebrows. "That's not a very nice thing to say." Yami patted her shoulder reassuringly and turned to Iwate.

"Doesn't matter to me. Anzu can decide, I don't know exactly how this scene goes, does she sink to the bottom, too?" Iwate played a bit with the fake necklace, twirling it around his index finger, Yami had the feeling it was going to fly away any minute.

"Anzu's character is not a very good swimmer, she desperately tries to get out of the water when she finds out she can't swim and eventually starts drowning. However, she won't sink to the bottom, that is, if you can prevent it." Iwate winked at him, causing Yami to frown. He looked at Yugi from the corner of his blood red eyes and saw that Yugi was trying to control himself, his hands were shaking against his sides and his eyes were shooting fire at the director.

"Where did this water scene come from? I've read the scene and I must say that this scene doesn't make any sense. Sophia is _not _some innocent girl who's naïve enough to lose her necklace at some random lake. She is not to be trusted!"

"Oh, boy…" Yami whispered to himself, covering his eyes with his hands. He knew Yugi was right, the scene did not make any sense to him, either and if he had to pick sides, he would definitely pick Yugi's. Anzu stayed perfectly still, her hands were folded behind her back (she had probably noticed that she had been fiddling with her clothes for ten minutes straight) and avoided eye contact.

"Yugi, I helped writing this script. Are you saying that I'm not a good writer?"

"No, I never said that. You can be a very good writer, but I'm starting to doubt the script. If you've read the book, you will see that Sophia is a very intelligent girl, whose grandmother is never even mentioned. I don't know where the necklace suddenly came from," Yugi breathed, his face had grown red with anger and he clenched his straight teeth. Yami had enough experience with Yugi to know that you should never start a fight with him, Yugi may look innocent to everyone, but he did have a backbone and always knew what he was doing, he was very sharp and smart enough to push someone into a corner during an argument. However, to Yami, it looked like Yugi was avoiding the actual point of this argument, but he could not put his finger on it.

"Have you ever seen a movie that followed every line of the book?"

"Actually, yes," Yugi said simply, folding his arms defensively over his chest. Iwate's face turned slightly red and turned back to Yami, who was casually looking at his feet, pretending to admire the black polished floor.

"Yami, why don't you have a little talk with our writer here. I'll prepare everything, meet me here in one minute with your swim trunks. And Anzu… Yeah, stay where you are, we'll be back." Anzu gave him a small nod and turned her back to Yami so she could stare at the huge water tank in front of her. Yugi looked as furious as ever and Yami carefully grabbed his wrist and dragged him away from Anzu. He decided to take Yugi to the small corner where the emergency exit was, a huge black door with a grey handle over it, so they could have some privacy.

They stood there in silence, Yugi avoided his gaze while Yami was trying to find right words to say, they never had arguments, maybe once or twice in four years, but they would make up right away, mainly because they found it hard to stay mad at each other. Most of the time, Yami blamed himself during those arguments, though this time he had no idea how to deal with this, so he decided to be careful.

"Aibou, you need to control yourself here. You have no idea what kind of power Riku has," Yami said quietly. "He could easily kick you out and then we won't be able to spend time together at all." When Yugi did not respond, he continued, "I know you're not telling me something. What was the real point of that argument?"

At this, Yugi merely shrugged. "Nothing. What makes you think that?" As response, Yami raised an eyebrow and gently grabbed Yugi's shoulder, pulling him closer to him; Yugi did not flinch.

"Because I know you better than you know yourself. What was that back there?" Yugi was reaching his breaking point, Yami could see it in his eyes; at first they were fierce and now they started softening. He looked up at Yami and when he did, his eyes grew fierce again, he shook his head and slowly pushed himself out of his grip.

"If you hadn't made me sign that contract, then I wouldn't have to see how that stupid director is going to ruin my book," Yugi said with a huff. "That scene is not supposed to be there, it's going to ruin the whole plot! I'm gonna read the rest of the script when we get back to the hotel and then talk with Riku about it tomorrow."

"You've already signed the contract, I don't think you'll be able to change anything about the script," Yami said quietly. Something was definitely up, Yugi would never get this upset over only one thing, there had to be something else. With a sigh, he turned his head away and sighed through his nose, running a hand through his wild hair. "We can talk about this later, I have to go back to the water tank."

"Hm." Feeling a slight weight appearing on his shoulder, Yami left Yugi standing there by himself, since he knew it would be useless to drag him along. He was giving him silent hints that he needed to be alone and all Yami could do was listen to his instincts and leave him be. He saw that Anzu was still staring at the tank, hugging her slim body as if her life depended on it.

"You all right?"

She jumped up and turned to him, her cheeks were slightly red and she blinked. "Y-yeah, I'm fine. It's… Weird that you have to save me. I hope I won't screw up." Yami gave her a reassuring smile.

"You won't screw up, Anzu. If it's too hard for you, we can ask Riku to use a doll instead of you." Anzu let out what sounded a like a mix between a whine and a squeak, she cleared her throat, clearly embarrassed that she had just made that sound and shook her head.

"No, I can do it. Besides, it's you who should be worried. Are you sure you're gonna jump in?" Yami felt content, Anzu was a really nice girl, most people would probably forget all about his problems, they cared too little about other people's problems, their own problems were far more important and Anzu was different, he liked that about her. If only he could build up their friendship, he did not want a friendship based off lies, but at this point, he did not want to cause any trouble, so he nodded in response.

Before Anzu could respond, Iwate walked up to them, grunted and tapped Yami's shoulder.

"Okay, go stand over there, on the edge and I'll let you know when you should jump. Let's see how deep you can get, eh?" He grinned, gave Yami a playful slap on his shoulder (which Yami did not find very playful) and pushed him towards the stairs that led to the top of the tank. "After this, we'll get your coach, who will help you for the next couple of weeks. First he has to see how far you can get on your own." Yami gave him a nod before he started climbing the stairs. He tried to look for Yugi on his way up, he gave up after a while, Yugi was nowhere to be found.

After a good forty seconds, he had reached the top and shakily stood on the edge of the tank. It was surely thirty feet. The smell of clean water made his shoulder relax a little bit, at least he did not have to deal with the smell of chlorine, or with irritated eyes. Though, he did feel lightheaded. He was not ready for this, not at all.

"Okay, Yami, you ready?" Iwate called. Yami gave him a shaky nod before he took off his shirt, pants and shoes. He did it as quickly as possible, he was starting to feel hot and clammy, his breaths became shaky, his breathing was getting out of control. He saw that his chest was moving faster and faster because of his fast breaths, stars danced in front of his eyes and his vision blurred. A horrible taste was forming itself in the back of his throat, he was going to throw up any minute, he felt so dizzy that he had to grab hold of the stairs to keep himself from falling. His lungs were screaming for air and his heart was losing control, it had started beating way too fast, it felt like it was hammering against his chest.

"Dive!" He opened his mouth to call for help, but his eyes rolled back and he fell forward. The last thing he heard was a loud splash and he felt that he was engulfed by water.

* * *

**Author's note: **All the Puzzleshippers and Yami fangirls will hate me. And I'm totally prepared for that. Yeah, you either gotta wait for the next chapter or read this chapter again to satisfy your hunger for Puzzle moments. It does have a lot of fluff. *grins*

What Yami felt is exactly what I felt when I almost fainted one time. You can faint from lack of air, water, food, being scared, traumatization, seeing blood, seeing other heavy things…. Yeah, not pleasant. I'm so glad I didn't lose consciousness that day. *sweatdrop*

School starts next week, will be a senior, will be busy, please be patient, gah.

Ohai, almost forgot, I have some good news for you. I've started working on the next chapter of A Death Wish, so please keep a lookout for that, I _will _finish that story, even it takes me years.

See you next chapter, please don't forget to leave a review on your way out~! x3


	5. Let's Get Down To Business

**Author's note: **I can haz a shameless self-promotion moment? Yes, of course I can, don't look at me like that.  
I'm currently editing Deadly Love, this story is my baby, but it desperately needed some improvement, I can't believe I uploaded those chapters. They were full of mistakes and OOCness and 4Kids-ness. Bleck.

So, please keep an eye out for the (sort of) new chapters! x3

Thanks for all the reviews, I really do appreciate them. Enjoy the new chapter~!

* * *

When one of his eyes flew open, he saw the darkness of the still young night through the white curtains. There was a small gap between the two curtains, a small slit of dark blue shone through it, it was as if the person that had closed the curtains had not closed them properly, or it had been done on purpose. There were no clouds or stars, the night had just begun. Maybe if he had not been lying in bed, he could have seen the small bright colored stroke of the sun in the distance.

A small but sharp sensation of nausea and pain shot through him, a small groan in the back of this throat was his own response to the annoying feeling. With his hand, he reached for his throbbing head, the pain was annoying him to no end, he saw small black dots appearing in front of his eyes and if he had not known better, he would have thought he had gone crazy. What had happened again?

He recognized his surroundings, it was his and Yugi's hotel room, and it was awfully quiet, except for the small rustling sound that came from the other room that he had yet to discover. With a second groan, he managed to heave himself up and swing his legs off the bed in a swift motion. A small cold sensation let him know that he was only wearing a pair of black boxers, his brain immediately responded with alarming bells, because he remembered that he had been wearing his swim trunks and _not _his boxers.

His dull, but sharp red eyes scanned the room and noticed that his suitcase was open, some of his clothes were gone and a few of the inner pockets were zipped open. Slightly alarmed, he looked around for his clothes and saw them lying in a neat pile on the nightstand next to his bed, on top of them lay his cellphone and his glasses. He only wore his glasses when his eyes were fatigued or irritated, or if he was reading a book. Well, his eyes _were _a bit moist and irritated, so he decided to put them on in a few minutes.

After he had changed, he started walking towards the other room where he hoped Yugi was, his buttons were still undone, he was feeling a bit drowsy still so he gave up after the first three tries. The room was about as big as their bedroom, the walls were painted beige, there were a total of four different couches with a few tables in front of them and even a big television with a DVD player and DVDs on top of it. Just like he had guessed, this was the lounge. The next thing he saw, got rid of the dizziness, because his eyes grew wide within less than a second.

Anzu was curled up in a large beige chair, her head was dangerously close to his best friend's lap, who was reading a book. She appeared to be fast asleep, her lips were parted and slow breaths came out, her closed eyes were almost hidden behind the small curtain of her brown hair. Her wrinkled clothes were the same clothes she had been wearing this morning, so he guessed that he had not slept more than a day.

Yugi was reading an English novel, it looked like one of the books he had seen in the bookcase, because he did not recognize the title. After he let out a small sound to make his presence clear, Yugi's eyes flew upwards to his own and his entire face lit up, practically enough to let the stars sparkle in the night sky.

"Yami." He carefully got up, making sure not to disturb Anzu on his way and walked up to his friend on the other side of the room. He gave a small wave with his hand to silently say that he had to take a step back. Yami obeyed and watched him close the two glass doors that were hidden between the walls. He took another step back, he felt uncomfortable with those glass doors, Anzu was still soundly asleep and was oblivious to the fact that she was being watched. He didn't mind having Anzu around, but he wanted to talk to Yugi _alone. _"I'm so glad you're awake." Arms circled themselves around his shoulders, hugging him tightly. He snapped out of his thoughts and looked down to see Yugi burying his face in his chest.

"Aibou," he breathed contently. He, too, wrapped his arms around Yugi's shoulders, placing his head on top of Yugi's. They stood like that for a full minute, neither of them spoke or moved, the only sound that filled the air were their soft breaths. Yami absently stroked Yugi's lower back, burying the tips of his finger in the fabric of his shirt so he could almost feel the soft skin under it. Yugi was the first one to pull back, he patted the back of his head, a sign Yami recognized, Yugi was nervous. Instead of asking him about it, he gently grabbed his hand and led him to their bedroom.

"Maybe you should lie down for a few more minutes. You might faint again if you don't," Yugi said to break the heavy silence that was lingering between them. Deciding that it was pointless to argue (he did not feel like lying down, at all), he lay down on his back, placing his hands behind his head to create his own pillow. Yugi sat on the edge of the bed, he pushed Yami's legs farther away with a small smile before he made himself comfortable and laid his shoulders on Yami's lower legs. "You weren't ready, were you?"

He did not even need Yugi to fill him in, he knew perfectly well what this was about. Without looking up, Yami answered him with only one single word.

"No."

"Why didn't you tell someone? You looked absolutely terrified when you were up there. And I honestly thought you had overcome your fear, but I guess it was all," he felt the weight of Yugi's shoulders moving and he looked down so they could look at each other. Yugi had narrowed his violet eyes a bit, but not enough to give him a cynical look. "just pretend."

Yami was at loss for words, it was as if he had lost the ability to speak, because he merely nodded in response, his face stuck in a neutral expression. The scowl on Yugi's face could mean that he was worried or mad, or many other things. The warmth of Yugi's body started to take its toll on his clothed legs, but it was so relaxing at the same time that he did not complain about it.

"Why did you do it?" Yami was slightly taken back, he was not entirely sure about it himself. He did put himself in danger and he did not even know why. His eyes drifted back to the ceiling, staring at it until they grew tired. Not only was he feeling nauseous, he also felt dizzy still and tired, all at the same time. Yugi waited patiently for him to answer his question while Yami counted the seconds in his head, the answer was quite obvious.

The look on Yugi's face when he swam towards him without a single problem had been indescribable; he had not looked that happy in _years. _And now that he thought about it, he wanted nothing more for Yugi to be happy, even if he was going to end up with Anzu. If it made Yugi happy, then he was not going to risk this wonderful friendship. Yugi had been so busy with his job for the past couple of years that he barely had any time to spend with Yami, let alone looking for a girlfriend.

Just like the small idea he had used to get Yugi to swim with him, it was all part of his hopeful idea to spend more time with him. He knew that it would probably be impossible to get rid of his fear, he was too scared to go swimming on his own accord. Living without swimming was not bad at all, he had everything he needed, already.

"_I don't need a girlfriend if I've got you, Yami." _Yugi did have his secrets, maybe he _did _want a girlfriend so he could be happier and live a less stressful life.

"Yugi? Oh, Yami, you're awake!" Said person snapped out of his thoughts, looked up and saw Anzu standing a couple of feet away from the bed. Her brown hair and clothes were rather messy and she was rubbing her eyes to get rid of the excess sleep in them. There was a big smile plastered on her face, not a fake smile, she was really happy that he had woken up. "Yeah, I visited your room after an entire day of shooting to see if you had woken up. Yugi and I decided to sit in the lounge, which was about two hours ago. I guess I was too tired to wait for you to wake up. What kind of friend does that?"

She grinned sheepishly, taking a seat next to Yugi on the bed. Yugi's hand was resting on Yami's knee, massaging the joint while staring at Anzu. And that was when Yami realized what she had said.

She saw him as a friend? The fact that she came here just to wait for him to wake up made him feel very warm. He did not know a lot of people who would do that for him, most of the time, people befriended him for the fame and not because they actually cared about him. Anzu had already proved that she truly cared about him. He would love to be her friend.

"It was a scary experience. About ten men ran over to the tank, they were so fast that it was only a matter of seconds before one of them dived in to get you back. You were so lucky, you really could've hurt yourself back there." Yami glanced over at Yugi, casually raising an eyebrow.

"Am I allowed to set up, yet?" With a playful smile, Yugi dramatically raised his wrist to look at his watch. Rolling his eyes, Yami sat up and laid his arms over Yugi's chest to prevent him from getting up. "Thanks you for coming over, I appreciate it and I'm sorry if I worried you. I'm going to talk to Riku tomorrow, because I won't be doing that again." Anzu laughed softly at Yugi's attempts to escape from Yami's grip and looked back at him with a kind smile.

"I'll go with you. It's a pointless scene, anyway. Like Yugi said, my character would never let that happen. He said we should meet him at six at the set tomorrow. Maybe we can go a little earlier before that so we can talk to him." Yami nodded gratefully and lifted his arms up so Yugi could sit up. There was a small moment of silence between the three adults, Anzu looked somewhat uncomfortable, she was rubbing her arm and chewing the inside of her cheek until she got up and dusted off her clothes. She mumbled a quiet goodbye and left without looking back. Apparently she felt that Yami and Yugi needed some more alone time, which was true, Yami still wanted to talk to him about a couple of things.

"Aibou," he spoke. Yugi turned to him with an awkward smile, his cheeks were tinted with a bright pink and his eyes were abnormally large. If Yami had not known better, he would have thought that Yugi was drunk. The smile slowly turned into a dreamy one, he was staring at Yami like he had walked through the portals of heaven. Yami could not help but smile at the sight, his own smile was not completely real, but it was good enough for Yugi.

Maybe he should not talk about what happened that morning, he already had a hunch, anyway. And he had to admit, he probably would have been jealous, too, if someone got the chance to dive after Yugi to save him.

"There's still some leftover dinner in the lounge if you want," Yugi stated quietly. With a small shake of his head, Yami leaned forward and blew in his face. It worked, Yugi jumped up and blinked twice at him, clearly out of his trance. "You know I hate it when you do that."

"I know," Yami said simply. "But you needed to snap out of it. You were staring at me." Yugi grinned rather sheepishly like Anzu had done a couple of minutes ago and leaned forward so he could brush his nose against Yami's cheek.

"Fine. You should still eat something before you faint from lack of food," he murmured, letting his cheek rest against Yami's, so his breath ghosted over his ear. When Yami stayed still, he continued with a soft sigh. "She fell asleep on the arm of the chair, which was right next to me. Nothing happened back there. If something had happened, I would have told you right away and you know that." They pulled back, Yugi was completely serious about this and Yami appreciated his honesty.

"…Okay," he said, smiling generously. He placed his hand on his own stomach, there were still a couple of knots, he did not trust his stomach at the moment. He shook his head and laid his head on the pillow, turning on his side. According to the alarm clock, they were nearing midnight. "I don't think I should eat something right now. It's late, anyway. Let's go to sleep." Yugi reached for the alarm clock and set it to make sure Yami would not miss his opportunity to talk to Iwate. Yami took off his glasses and set them next to his alarm clock, his vision blurred for a second and he had to shake his head to get rid of it.

"Yami?" He turned to Yugi, who was now leaning over him, and just now, Yami noticed how tired and worried he truly looked. He was a bit paler than usual and his bright violet eyes were drooping and glassy. "Can I sleep with you tonight?"

"As long as you don't end up lying on top of me, like you always do, then fine."

_Wham._

"Thank you." Yami rubbed his head where Yugi had hit him with a pillow, it had not exactly hurt, but he had the feeling his head was spinning like a spinning wheel. Yugi smiled innocently and lay down next to him. They only slept together when Yugi was feeling uncomfortable or when he did not want to be alone, they had not done this in more than three years, now that they were both adults. And what always made Yami laugh, was the fact that Yugi always moved a lot in his sleep and ended up lying on top of Yami in the process. Not that he minded, he just liked to tease Yugi about it.

"You didn't have to hit me," Yami grumbled, tapping the light switch that was right next to his bed. He pulled the covers over his and Yugi's shoulders, noticing that they had not even changed out of their clothes. He only got a chuckle as response, he could not see Yugi anymore, so he let his hands snake around, until he felt something soft. "Aibou?" Yugi's warm hand touched his outstretched one, playing with his fingers.

"You shouldn't worry too much, you know. You'll always be my number one," he whispered. For a moment, Yami thought his heart made a little jump, Yugi had never voiced how important he was to him, he had no idea what it was like to hear those words. He was frozen on the spot, he barely felt Yugi's slim fingers still playing with his own until his movements stopped and his soft and even breaths filled the quiet air. The smile that ended up on his face, was the first real smile that night.

* * *

"You want me to _what?_" Iwate had slammed his hands on his desk, his brown eyes were sparkling dangerously and his lips had thinned to the point where they looked like one straight line. "Are you out of your minds?"

Yami and Anzu looked at each other, Anzu's blue eyes were fearful while Yami's eyes were calm. They were sitting in Iwate's office, it was a little before six in the morning and the three of them had left the set to talk about the water scene. And apparently, Iwate was not too happy to hear that they thought the scene was pointless.

"My character is way too smart to drop a random necklace into the water," Anzu said shakily but confidently. "Besides, she doesn't even have a grandmother."

"That's what Yugi said, too, can't you come up with better arguments?" Iwate said, he was calmer now and Yami had the nagging feeling that they were not going to win this argument. Iwate had way too much power, they were like puppets to him, and they had no choice but to follow his rules. The director sat back down in his leather chair and folded his hands together, his whole posture relaxing. "Look, most of the time, directors don't do exactly everything that's in the book, that's just how it works."

"That's an invalid argument," Yami snapped sharply, causing Iwate to rise from his chair again. "This doesn't have anything to do with that, this is about adding random scenes that can ruin the whole plot." Iwate narrowed his eyes to slits, leaning over his desk until he was practically lying on top of it, crushing it under his body.

"Watch that mouth of yours, Yamanashi. It could cost you," he said through gritted teeth. Yami did not even flinch, instead he, too, narrowed his eyes and leaned back to gain some of his personal space. "We have a contract, if you two don't agree, then I guess you have to fly back to Japan and miss this great opportunity. It's your choice."

"You're acting very childish, Mr. Iwate. We came all the way over here and if we have one little argument over a scene, it's over? We can at least try to discuss this," Anzu said defiantly. Iwate shot her a look, still hanging over his desk, he snorted.

"You're the ones acting like children, because you don't want to do this scene. Are we going to have the same argument when you two have to sleep together?"

There were two different reactions. Anzu had let out something that sounded like a high-pitched squeak, her face had gone bright red and she was covering her mouth that had fallen open. Yami had almost pulled out the arm of the chair, but somehow managed to keep the chair in one piece. Iwate sneered at them, amused.

"_What did you just say?_" Yami growled, after he had straightened up. Anzu shut her eyes for a moment before she reached for her bag to grab her script. "May I remind you that in the book, it was _implied _that we had slept together, Aibou did not exactly describe the scene. Are you telling me that this movie is going to be rated NC-17?" Anzu was frantically skipping through the pages of the script, her face was still as red as a tomato, the squeaks that left her made her sound like a small mouse. Iwate's grin was almost splitting his cheeks and if it would not, Yami would take care of it.

"It's all in the script, as soon as Anzu finds it, she can show you. Let me know if you want to discuss this, too. I can't guarantee you that it will help, but one can always try. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to talk to the new members of the crew." He stood up with a grunt and made his way out of his chic office. When he closed the door behind him, Anzu practically shoved the script into Yami's face.

"Here, look! I must have read over it, because it only says we end up on the bed and then a new scene starts. Where does it say that we have to have…" her face started glowing again and she hid her face in her hands, her script clutched to the side of her head. "I'm so stupid! I should have seen it coming, I can't believe he's making us do this."

Yami was rubbing his eyes with his index and middle finger, trying to control his temper. If he did not calm down, he would rip that door open and give Iwate a piece of his mind. Then again, it was also Yami's own fault for not reading the script first before signing the contract. Anzu rose to her feet and started pacing, muttering incoherent things.

"We'll fix this, Anzu," Yami muttered, after he had run his hands over his face and propping his elbows on her knees, his hands hung carelessly between his legs, his fingers loosely pointing to the ground. He looked up at her; she was fiddling with the pink loose blouse she was wearing, she pulled at the collar a few times and sucked in her bottom lip at the same time. "It's obvious that we are uncomfortable with this." She turned to him, her eyes wide.

"I-it's nothing personal," she squeaked. Yami merely chuckled at this, hanging his head and closing his eyes, the weight of his head felt heavier than usual, his neck started to hurt. The smile on his face never left, though, he truly liked how Anzu was concerned about _him. _

"I know that. We've only known each other a couple of days, I'm not that kind of person who would jump in a bed with a stranger." He stood up and walked around the chair so he could face her, he folded his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall with his hip. "We have to talk to him about this as soon as possible. They can't make us do this if we really don't want to. This is our movie, we're supposed to have fun and if Riku can't give us something to look forward to, then we'll quit."

He had his own reasons for not wanting to do this. Every time he looked at Anzu, she reminded him of Yugi and of the fact that he could not do this to Yugi, even if it was fake. Guilt would eat at him for the rest of his life and Yugi would probably never stop talking about it. He had to tell Yugi about this, he had to come to the set everyday to give it his blessings, so it was one of the unavoidable things.

"…Mm-hm," Anzu hummed and tapped her pink nails against each other. A small droplet of sweat trickled down the side of her face and Yami frowned at this, she must have been really upset about this. She shook her head, her brown hair flew over her shoulders and she put on a small smile. "We'll talk to him. He's not as nice as I thought he was."

"He's nice when he gets what he wants," Yami murmured, putting his hand on Anzu's arm and gently leading her out of the office. "Let's get some breakfast. After that, we'll meet the new crew members." He looked over his shoulder, grinning. "I'm meeting my best friend, and I heard his name is Katsuya Jounouchi."

* * *

**Author's note: **Welp, it's almost two in the morning for me, so I apologize in advance for any spelling and/or grammar mistakes that I've missed. Though, I'm quite sure I got rid of them all. *scratches her head*

So, yeah, the tension is rising. I was actually going to put this part in the later chapters, but my head kept bugging me and said that I should write it out in this chapter. Maybe it _is_ better this way.

I'm sorry that I'm such a crappy updater, I had a performance this week and had a lot of practicing to do. Mid-terms start in less than two weeks, I also decided to play two more instruments, so that's gonna take some time, too. o.o; I have a busy, but happy life.

Reviews are appreciated~. x3


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